Archinect - designHUSTLE

The Amoebius Machine

2014-04-03T11:54:00-04:00

The Amoebius Machine is a project I started in my last semester of graduate school at the University of Michigan almost a year ago. It began as an experiment in representational techniques involving both digital and manual strategies converging within the same drawing. The project was started under the guidance of Professor Perry Kulper but unfortunately it went unfinished at the time as my Thesis work took precedence over both this work, and also eating, sleeping... showering.

After graduation I slowly began to come back to the work. Each time I worked on a drawing, the project would become more and more involved until eventually I realized the work had evolved from a representational project into a full-scale architectural proposition.

My intention here is to roll out this work slowly and over multiple posts, as it is very much a work in progress. Each post will try to build up the narrative of the work through both text and representation. In this first post I will attempt to set t...

dematerializedTERRITORIES: Part Two

2013-10-15T10:25:00-04:00

In part one of this three part series on my thesis research (which concluded last May) I gave an overview of the ambitions of the project and some of the ideas and outcomes that emerged along the way.

I will use this post to talk about some of the major results of those ideas; in particular, a full-scale installation in Detroit entitled Installation 7721. I generally hate giving names to my research projects, a conclusion I came too after seeing multiple studio projects from my peers get crushed at final reviews based solely on the perceived relevance of their titles. Why talk about the ideas behind the work when we can just spend 35 minutes talking about what the title means? That happened way too much at school. Thus I kept it simple for the naming convention of my final installation. Installation 7721 is named for the address of the houses where the work was located...keeping it simple.

Anyways, while the previous post showcased some of the drawings and 2D representation...

dematerializedTERRITORIES: Part One

2013-09-24T19:40:00-04:00

This is the first of a 3-part series I plan on doing that (finally) presents my thesis work, which concluded this past May. I have been planning this out for a while, however since I graduated and starting working full-time I have found it extremely hard to motivate myself to do anything after work except sit on my couch and catch up on 6 years of TV shows on Netflix. You think reading Foucault is mind blowing? Try binge watching Breaking Bad and Lost at the same time....BOOM!

I would have caught up on these shows earlier, but isn't depriving one's self of basic human comforts like sleep, food and Walter White the essence of graduate school? Now that I am a working professional however, I thought it would be alright to splurge on a few small comforts like haircuts and romaine lettuce (it's the little things in life, right?).

Anyways, back to my thesis. The work presented in the next few posts is intended to both showcase the final results of the ideas developed during my thes...

A PLOT: Taubman College Thesis Group

2013-08-09T18:09:00-04:00

A PLOT is one of the (9) thesis groups at Taubman College to recently complete final presentations (by recently I mean several months ago). Below is a look at some of the resulting work and investigations.

A PLOT brief:
As cities are strained, once familiar settings become anomalies or strangers to their original intentions. Material conglomerations acquire obscure and unfamiliar attributes, occupations and associations as the raw material of the city falls in and out of expected definitions, setting the stage for questionable legal, cultural and environmental interpretations. In a tangle of material culture and spatial implications speculation alone misses the unexpected push of reality. As an alternative, direct material manipulations and the actual items of production, collapse architectural interpretation with the city itself.

A two-fold definition, PLOT simultaneously collapses the keen focus on the physical and circumstantial attributes of explicit locations, and the we...

Research Proposal

2013-07-26T08:39:00-04:00

Building off of my Thesis work (which i will do a blog post on soon) I recently completed a fellowship proposal that would allow me to expand on some of the core issues. Here is a look at what I submitted.

“…one would have to get past the idea of urban fabric altogether and look at ways buildings are spatially charged, how objects hold space around them, and how the space around buildings stage the object quality of the building.”
- Jason Young, Density of Emptiness

Research Abstract

As Jason Young describes in the above quote, the urban fabric of the city is only one lens with which to view the city. Another lens would be to look at the spaces created, and destroyed, by the city. In a world where the city is the great cultivator of space, buildings are its primary tool. Buildings are deployed within the city to domesticate the vastness of the open landscape into an agglomeration ...

[En]Coding Architecture 2013 now on video

2013-07-25T13:23:00-04:00

Archinect, its been too long my old friend.

It seems like a lifetime since I last posted a blog entry, pretty silly considering what an awesome platform this is for sharing all things designHUSTLE with the world. Well all that changes now!

While a post-graduation malaise is the main culprit for my blogging absence, it also might have something to do with moving (back) to Boston and starting an exciting new job in the always eventful world of architecture. Anyways, over the course of the next few weeks I will be posting as many entries as I can to get back up to speed.

To start things off, here is a video of my team and I presenting our Fall 2012 project entitled, deferentialCONSTRUCTIONS, at the [En]coding Architecture conference at Carnegie Mellon University this past February. There is also a much more comprehensive look at this project in an early blog post, if interested.

Enjoy!

deferentialCONSTRUCTIONS

http://vimeo.com/album/2467497/video/66973447

other [...

Drawing Speeds with Perry Kulper

2013-05-20T17:14:00-04:00

In my last semester at Taubman College I had the privilege of taking an amazing drawing class with one of the school’s foremost experts on drawing and representation, Perry Kulper. His work has been published extensively, in addition to several posts here on archinect.

For the purposes of the drawing seminar, the work was split up into (4) drawing assignments which explored various methods of using drawing as a generative operation, instead of merely a representational one.

At the end of the semester we held an exhibition to showcase the most interesting work. The majority of the work showcased was from our last two assignments, “generative removal” and “real slow.” Each of the drawing projects involved a large commitment of both time and energy from myself and my fellow classmates. A commitment that, at least in my opinion, was paid back 10x by the final work.

Generative Removal
This work focuses on erasure as a means of generating an arch...

propose[EXISTING]

2013-02-24T13:58:00-05:00

So my last post has induced a lot of diverse responses and opinions...which is awesome. As a work in progress, it is great to be able to get feedback to help me clarify and/or reframe my argument.

As predicted, a conversation has emerged about 'ruin porn' which unfortunately has become synonymous with Detroit and will be present in any discussion surrounding the city's past/present/future. As a means to clarify my position and to try to move the discussion into more productive avenues, below is my working Thesis Statement/Manifesto.

propose[EXISTING]

The city of Detroit, like many cities that saw incredible growth and expansion during the decades surrounding the Industrial Revolution, has also seen incredible decline in its absence. While there are many factors that have contributed to the deterioration of the post-industrial city, issues discussed here will focus on haphazard building regulations, uncontrolled growth, lack of construction oversight, segregation and ...

DETROIT: from now to then

2013-02-21T14:20:00-05:00

As part of my thesis research into the past, present and future realities of Detroit housing, I have started to use representational devises as a means of speculation. The current work seeks out opportunities, not in the present or future, but embedded in the past.

This current work explores possibilities for what I am calling functionalDETERIORATIONS which are those operations that seek to reframe distress as additive or generative to architecture instead of subtractive.

this is ongoing research and their will be much more coming, but for now some images...

you can check out the entire set at my new website... http://designGOOD.us

Taxonomy Project: Thesis Readings

2013-01-28T12:15:00-05:00

In the course of thinking about ways to avoid working on my thesis, I came up with an idea to launch what I am calling the "Taxonomy Project." Basically, I am trying to document the life/work/play of a thesis student, using Taubman College as a case study.

What I am trying to get at moves past the final product of thesis research that is up on the walls in May or posted on blogs and facebook along the way. Instead I want to look at the process of developing a thesis through the materials, literature and organizational logics with which we chose to surround ourselves.

Things that really interest me personally are things like sketchbooks, reading materials, work space layout, internet bookmarks...just thinking out loud. There is a really diverse collection of thesis projects and people here at Taubman College and while this project will almost certainly uncover variety, singularities and peculiarities, it should also reveal areas of homogeneity. I hope that uncovering these...

Final Review: Fall 2012

2013-01-03T00:37:00-05:00

A few weeks ago our studio, Apophenic Ecologies with Adam Fure and visiting professor Matias del Campo, finished up with an amazing final review. Considering we had almost as many critics as students in the studio, it was a little intimidating. Fortunately, each of the 3 student teams produced awesome work and it was easily one of the best and most productive final reviews I have been participated in.

Anyways, below is our final project brief and images from the final review. Enjoy!

deferentialCONSTRUCTIONS takes its cue from the phenomenon known as Apophenia, which is the perceiving of meaningful patterns in seemingly random or meaningless data. If used advantageously, apophenia can allow for multiple readings within a single spatial environment. The project attempts to leverage a basic architectural proto-condition to test out the implications and possibilities inherent within this phenomenon. The goal is to create a system which, by oscillating between...

A PLOT: thesis work at Taubman College

2012-11-30T15:28:00-05:00

Cross-plotting: Detroit to Windsor is an exhibition by a group of Master of Architecture students at the University of Michigan. The group is formulated around a research practice that investigates the unfolding circumstances of the city through full-scale-work: making is used as a means to reveal, critique, and alter the realities of our urban settings. The exhibition focuses on specific plots of land in Detroit by exploring their material and atmospheric conditions as well as their immaterial regulations, degrees of neglect, and idiosyncrasies. Each student has chosen a plot of land in Detroit and designed a container that re-frames materials from that plot within their displaced context in Windsor.

The group is collaborating with the artist-led interdisciplinary collective Broken City Lab, as well as the Creative Rights legal team. The attitudes and research practices developed for this work will inform a yearlong thesis studio.

The above brief lays the ground ...

propositionSTUDIO: Apophenic Ecologies

2012-11-13T14:06:00-05:00

This semester my studio is under the supervision and guidance of Taubman College's visiting professor, Matias del Campo of SPAN (http://www.span-arch.com/). Matias, along with Taubman College professor Adam Fure, are leading an exploration into what they call "Apophenic Ecologies" which alludes to the phenomenon of perceiving meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data, known as Apophenia. The most common example of this phenomenon is reading shapes or figures in a collection of clouds in the sky.

In groups of 3-4 our studio is looking at how produce these types of multiple readings by creating seemingly meaningless patterns within very basic architectural elements. My group is looking at openings and apertures within a single surface condition. We are exploring various ways to produce patterns and openings which oscillate between meaning and meaningless, control and lack of control. This exploration with result in full-scale fabrications for t...

Learning from the Digital Technology Revolution

2012-11-12T12:09:00-05:00

What can architecture learn from the Tech Revolution

Maybe nothing?
Maybe everything?

I have been thinking about this post for a while and its original title was going to be, “What can architects learn from Apple” but with the recent release of Windows 8 I think my thoughts can apply to a much larger spectrum. The reason I originally focused on Apple was because I think (and I am sure I am not alone) they have the best design minds in the game.

Full disclosure, I have owned multiple iPods in my day and currently have both an iPhone and iPad, so my opinion is clearly skewed in Apple’s favor. Anyways, what I love most about Apple as a company and brand is their complete dedication to the idea that their design aesthetic and approach is the best and everyone else must either accept it or be left behind. You can hate on the aesthetic, but you can’t hate on their unwavering belief in their own design. I believe that architects would benefit from this undying belief in...

designMANIFESTO: responding to Design Intelligence

2012-09-21T15:44:00-04:00

This is an exciting post for me as it will not only cover a topic that has framed most of my M.Arch education, but also because it is the first post of this blog's new format… the transition from education to profession and all the interstitial space in between. I can think of no better beginning to the blog's new format than to examine the idea of Design Intelligence as discussed by Michael Speaks.

I just finished reading Design Intelligence by Michael Speaks for the second time. The first time it was recommended to me by my Theory professor, Amy Kulper, and this time it was recommended by our visiting studio professor, Matias del Campo. The article starts like this…

“As postmodernism, deconstructivism, minimalism and super-postmodernism become more historical than contemporary concerns, professional trend setters in architecture are aggressively on the hunt for the next big thing”

Speaks then goes on to say that no dominant style looms on the horizon and that he se...

The un-American state of higher education in the US.

2012-09-03T15:29:00-04:00

DISCLAIMER:
Welcome to my new blog! I originally created this blog last year in order to provide a glimpse into the world of Taubman College at the University of Michigan and the life of a graduate student in the program. While I thoroughly enjoyed reporting on all the “happenings” here at UofM, for a variety of reasons I feel that now is the time to transition to a new format. While still periodically providing a view into the life of graduate school here at Taubman College, this blog will now focus primarily on my efforts as both a student and entrepreneur as I move into my last year of architecture school and begin to look toward the future. The exciting yet difficult transition from student to professional will be at the heart of this blog.

Disclaimers aside, let me end my school blog career with a “walk-off” rant on higher education:

As I move into my last year of graduate school, the realities of what I have gotten myself into, i.e. student loans, is tu...

Liberty Lofts: Taubman College West

2012-07-13T14:00:08-04:00

If you are a young, plump child with a sweet tooth then Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory is the place for you. If you are an architect or architecture student looking to make moves, head to Taubman College's newest addition, Liberty Lofts.

Liberty Lofts is located on the west side of Ann Arbor and hosts a wide range of events and services for the architecture program. The old auto factory (maybe) was originally purchased in order to give the school's faculty more flexible office and research spaces. It has since morphed into a flexible space used by the school for not only faculty research, but also school events, presentations and student reviews.

Just as Frank Lloyd Wright had Taliesin West as a winter escape to the Arizona desert, Taubman College has Liberty Lofts. An escape from the office, the classroom and the studio. The good news for us is we don't have to trek across the desert to get there.

In recent months Liberty Lofts has played host t...

Final Table Design_Architecture of Objects 2012

2012-05-07T17:41:00-04:00

In my last post I showcased some of the work done this semester in my "Architecture of Objects" course led by Professor Shaun Jackson. I am sure everyone who checked it out would agree there were some really awesome lights and furniture pieces in this year's showcase.

This post will give a closer look at my final piece for the course, a coffee table prototype which arose from the desire to create an object with radically different interior and exterior relationships. The exterior of the table is very geometrically precise with straight lines and hard edges. The interior, on the other hand, allows for a loosening of the geometry and results in a free-formed and undulating surface.

The table is made from laminated strips of birch plywood which are then CNC routed based on a Rhino software model to create the interior geometry. After the four sides are cut on the CNC, they are sanded to create a smooth surface and attached together.

Here is a video we taped while CNC r...

The Architecture of Objects

2012-05-02T12:31:00-04:00

Weeeee Diiiiiid it!!!!!

Studio finals are over and I have emerged from my studio cocoon only to realize that posting on Archinect is only one of the many things that has taken a backseat to school in recent weeks. In an attempt to make up for lost time I am preparing a full on blitzkrieg of blog posts over the next several days showcasing the final student work coming out of Taubman College this semester.

In following posts I will highlight my final studio work for the semester as part of the Vertical Cities Asia competition, as well as the awesome Thesis work done by the now graduated M.Arch class of 2012, but for now lets take a look at the final exhibition of the work coming out of "Architecture of Objects" lead by professor Shaun Jackson (http://bit.ly/Imb8fi ).

This was an awesome course and one which I had been looking forward to taking ever since I was accepted into the U of M program. The goal of the course (as Shaun would remind us many times) was to com...

Theories on Architecture

2012-04-10T15:13:00-04:00

Over the course of the semester I have been taking a course on Architecture Theory with one of Taubman College's foremost Theorists, Professor Amy Kulper (http://bit.ly/IeZlAl). It is safe to say that this course has blown my mind and has given me a lot to think about as I prepare for thesis next fall.

As part of our final project the students were asked to engage in independent research based around a critical text. My assigned text was "Atlas of Novel Tectonics" by Reiser and Umemoto. The idea was to develop an argument with respect to the text and use that argument to engage in a conceptual and theoretical exploration.

My exploration centers around globalization and a move towards the universally conditioned landscape (as described by Kenneth Frampton). I propose that this could actually be a good thing for architecture and set the stage for tectonics as the new "architecture of resistance."

Enjoy, also please comment because I would love to here feedback.

T...

Taubman College Externship Program Highlights 2012

2012-03-23T18:03:00-04:00

The Spring Break Externship Program here at Taubman College (http://bit.ly/GNqs6A) is one of the best resources for the students at the school. Basically, it is a week-long, unpaid internship program that places current students at a firm in the location of their choice (almost anywhere in the country) with the goal of gaining real world experience while creating professional connections in firms or locations that interest them. The program is headed up by our Student Career Counselor Beth Berenter who is an absolute rockstar and will do almost anything to help student get where they want to go.

Of the 170 students that participated in the program this year, I have asked 5 of them to write about their experience. We will start with my own experience at Safdie Architects in Boston, MA.

Safdie Architect, Boston

This year was my second time participating in the externship program here at Taubman College. I had the good fortune of being placed Safdie Architects in Boston,...

Construction Site Tour: Broad Museum by Zaha Hadid

2012-03-21T12:32:00-04:00

In a rare break of the studio grind our studio had the chance this week to tour the new Broad Museum by Zaha Hadid, currently in construction on the MSU campus in East Lansing, MI. A reward from our professors for going on 2+ months of no sleep. A less critical view would be that our professors think our projects are so wicked awesome that we deserved a break. Lets go with the latter.

Anyways, seeing a building as prestigious as the Broad Museum under construction was amazing. The multiple feats of engineering and construction that go on behind the scenes in order to bring buildings like this to reality are unbelievable. We lucked out and had one of the architects from the local architecture firm working on the project (Integrated Design Solutions) available to give us an extensive tour through the entire building, which is about 80-90% complete and scheduled to open sometime this year.

The overall design of the museum is...interesting. It has the classic Zaha Hadid ...

Vertical Cities studio: Schematic Design Review

2012-02-26T17:23:00-05:00

Spring Break 2012... whoohoo!!!!

I think spring break in graduate school serves a slightly different purpose than in undergrad. For undergrads it is usually a time to cut loose and get after it. However, for graduate students, when spring break rolls around their is only one thing on our minds... SLEEP!

Last week marked the halfway point in the semester and along with it, schematic review presentations for our studio's Vertical Cities competition entries. Each of the five studios, comprised of 19 students and 2 professors, is using their master plan models (shown in the previous blog post) to develop prototypical building designs.

In particular, our studio has broken up into groups of 3, with each group tackling a different building typology found in our master plan. Building typologies being looked at are high-rise towers, courtyard buildings, low-rise housing, agricultural buildings and hybrids of each.

In addition to designing for 100k people per sq...

A look back at M.Arch, year 1

2012-02-15T16:56:00-05:00

I feel guilty because I have not blogged in about two weeks. But here's why...

Over the past several weeks I have been doing what is usually the most enjoyable/dreadful/nervous/hilarious (depending on how you look at it) thing any student can do while in school...MAKE A NEW PORTFOLIO! I had started this portfolio last summer and got about 97% complete before school started up again in the fall. Five months later I am proud to report I finally completed the last 3%.

Instead of running through the usual portfolio drill of updating an existing portfolio, through adding new projects and subtracting older ones, I decided to go in a different direction. The plan is to have a completely autonomous portfolio for each of my 3 years of graduate school here at Taubman College. This way at the end of my three years I will have three portfolios to provide a complete history of my time at Michigan.

The whole portfolio can be found here... http://bit.ly/wDbf0K

In case cli...

design a city in 4 days....GO!

2012-01-26T13:19:00-05:00

This week at Taubman College marked the 2nd iteration of a new pilot program at the school, Masterclass or Expert in the studio. I am sure all of my dedicated and loyal readers will remember my post from our Alexander d'Hooghe charrette last semester, but for those you didn't read it (hard to believe I know) this began last semester with the idea of bringing in an "expert" in specific areas we are tackling in studio and holding a week-long, super intense charrette where nothing else in the world matters.

Free tickets to the super bowl, "sorry bro, gotta charrette."

Spontaneous call from Frank Gehry asking if I could fly to LA for an interview, "can't dude, charretting."

Anyways, for this semesters version of Masterclass Dan Wood of workAC was brought in to help each studio design a new masterplan for Seoul, South Korea as part of the Vertical Cities competition the school is participating in.

But here's the rub, the whole masterplan has to be co...

Research Through Making 2012

2012-01-22T23:06:00-05:00

This past weekend TCAUP was home to both Whither Architecture: A symposium intended on investigating "installations" as a framework for architecture; and the presentation and gallery opening of this years' Research Through Making projects. Needless to say, it was a very exciting weekend.

Research Through Making is a program initiated by our Dean, Monica Ponce de Leon in 2009 to promote making, and is now in its third year at TCAUP. The program awards research grants in the form of $20,000 to faculty members for the production of a project predicated on MAKING. It is by far the coolest thing going right now, in the whole state of Michigan.

Listed below are this years' 5 recipients and their projects:

Dirty Work
(Neal Robinson)

Starting from ground and working skyward, Dirty Work takes up colloquial earth as both building material and recalibrated “promised land.” Kaolin – a dense, white, hard-working mineral, becomes host to the architectural inquiry in whi...

STUDIO BIG BOX. the finale (fall 2011 recap)

2012-01-15T11:56:59-05:00

"Hey hsolie!
We noticed you haven't updated your blog "The Michigan Difference" in a while.

Do you have something new to say?
Click here post a new entry.
http://archinect.com/add_blogpost/23116650

Are you totally done with this blog?
Click here to archive your blog (select the "Archive this blog" checkbox) http://archinect.com/edit_blog/23116650

If you want to keep it open, but aren't ready to post something now, don't worry, we'll send another reminder next month. "

Archinect sent me this email a few days ago. I guess its time to come out from under my final review/holiday coma and start blogging again. To that end here is a look back at our final review for my BIG BOX studio this past semester, as well as a look at some of the other work being done around the school.

STUDIO BIG BOX. the finale

Our final review was very.....successful?

I think developing a studio project around the big box typology is a very hard task to attack. The idea...

A closer look at Representation 516

2011-12-13T16:38:48-05:00

as promising in my last post, here is a closer look at my individual section's projects for our Representation Studio here at TCAUP...

Our student section, lead by professor Tsz Yan Ng (http://bit.ly/vIdjCn), was focused on creating full scale horizontal surfaces using digital technology and fabrication techniques. While the final product was a full scale fabrication, the overall aim of the studio was to create a set of working drawings for our project. Each set of drawings would detail and explain every element of the project, focusing on Design, Fabrication and Assembly.

The idea was that while we were creating a full scale mockup here at school, we could send our detailed drawing set to anyone anywhere in the world and they would be able to recreate the project without ever speaking to us (even if they didn't speak english).

Some of the constraints of the project included limiting the number of unique units to between 3-5, stressing horizontality and creating ...

Representation Studio presentations

2011-12-07T16:46:11-05:00

Today was the final day and showcase of our Representation Studio, a 2nd year grad student wide course focused on representation and its various methods and techniques.

from the syllabus...

"Here in Taubman College, the discipline and program of Architecture are at a
crossroads with regard to representation. Amid rapidly-changing sets of personal
and professional media practices, the Architecture program needs to rethink its
representational conventions."

Since there are over a 100 of us 2nd year students, we were broken up into smaller sections focusing on more specific representational interests.

Christian Unverzagt section

Wireframing. This section will pursue and develop a disciplined approach to the
construction of measured drawings through various drawing analogues, such as
metal wire assemblies. It will do so via forms of projection traditionally used for
architectural production, including orthographic and perspectival methods and seek
to expand thos...

Masterclass, Taubman College

2011-11-10T15:47:23-05:00

An Architecture of the Territory

That was the title of a recently completed pilot program at TCAUP. The program is tentatively called "Visiting Experts" and consisted of an intensive week-long workshop effort lead by an outside guest and involving, at least this time around, the entire 2nd year graduate student body. For the program's first workshop the school invited Alexander D'Hooghe, Associate Professor in Architectural Urbanism at MIT.

Here are some of the workshops goals and ambitions:

"This Masterclass assigns to the field of Architecture the responsibility of ordering a generic American landscape. By ordering is meant a durable, civic structure composed of hard objects that are unambiguous about their potential to orient citizens, order the space into legible sectors and define the most important moments of intermodal transition.

This Masterclass aims to achieve: FIRST and most important - we try to objectify infrastructure: that is, we do not treat it as syst...